Fire in the Hole!

In the comments section of one of my recent posts, Cneil posted a link to some photos and information about the Fire In The Hole ride at Silver Dollar City in Branson, Mo.  I enjoyed it so much that I wanted to post the link to make sure that nobody misses it.  I learned a lot about Fire In The Hole that I didn’t know.

Fire In The Hole is a similar ride to The Blazing Fury at Dollywoood, and as far as I know, they were both designed and built in the 70s.  There are  some differences between the two rides, however.  I was surprised to learn that the theme of Fire In The Hole is much darker than the theme of The Blazing Fury.

The plot of The Blazing Fury is that a town is on fire and firefighters are trying to put it out.  That’s basically it – the cause of the fire isn’t mentioned.  Despite the burning town, The Blazing Fury is a light-hearted ride overall, with most of the scenes focusing on comedy.  For instance, there’s one scene where a girl is chasing a guy around a burning house because she wants a kiss, and he tells her that she looks like she’s “been kissing that steam train”.  There’s also the famous scene where Molly is about to jump off the roof of the burning hotel into the arms of Luther, who is waiting to catch her.  “Now Molly, you be careful, because I’ve got a weak back.”  “Weak back or not, get ready Luther, cause here I come!”  There are some thrills at the end of the ride, with a collapsing bridge, an near-miss with an oncoming train, and a water splash.  It’s interesting to note that a fireman yells “Fire in the Hole!” near the end of the ride, which is the name of the ride at Silver Dollar City.

According to Cneil’s description, Fire In The Hole adds an additional element to the plot – the town is on fire because it’s being ransacked by bandits called “BaldKnobbers”.  As opposed to The Blazing Fury’s light-hearted theme, Fire In The Hole sounds more like a horror-themed ride.  The BaldKnobbers aren’t ordinary bandits.  They look more like villians out of a horror movie, with black hoods over their faces and something that looks like antennas sticking out of the tops of their heads.  There are scenes of BaldKnobbers pointing guns and even a cannon at the riders.  There are even dead townspeople lying around that have been done in by the BaldKnobbers.  I’d highly recommend that you check out Cneil’s blog to see photos and to learn more about Fire In The Hole.

Here’s the link to Cneil’s Silver Dollar City posts:  http://cneil.blogspot.com/search/label/Silver%20Dollar%20City?max-results=20

A Little Q & A

As I continue to try to get back in the swing of posting on a more regular basis, I thought I’d respond to some of the questions and comments that readers have posted over the course of the past few months.

In response to my column about Wrestlemania 24, Rich asked if there is still such a thing as wrestling PPVs. I can confirm that yes, they still exist. I’m still a pro wrestling fan, although I don’t watch all of the PPVs any more. The group of people that I watched PPVs with a few years ago dwindled from a high of more than a dozen down to just 2 or 3 most of the time nowadays. We now skip most WWE PPvs, because they are the most expensive, and most of them aren’t worth the price. We do watch all of the TNA PPVs, because they’re always good. We’ve been ordering Ring of Honor’s occasional PPVs too.

In response to one of my Dollywood posts, Dan posted some great thoughts about Silver Dollar City in Branson, Mo. Dollywood and Silver Dollar City are sister parks (they are owned by the same company). Dollywood was once a Silver Dollar City also, and many of the attractions that were built in the 70s and early 80s were duplicated at both parks. I talked about the old Inventor’s Mansion that used to be at Dollywood, and Dan said that Silver Dollar City still has one! He also said that there is still a Flooded Mine at Silver Dollar CIty, but that it had been redone electronic guns and targets throughout the ride. That sounds similar to Dollywood’s new ride for 2008, the River Battle. It has water guns that can be used to shoot at targets – or bystanders!

Norma replied to one of my Andy Griffith Show posts and asked if there was anywhere that she could get the duet of Andy and Peggy singing “Down in the Valley” without having to buy all of Season 3 on DVD. I’m not sure, but I’ll post a link to it if I find it anywhere online. Norma also said she had read that Frances Bavier (Aunt Bee) thought that Andy didn’t like her. I actually thought that I had heard it the other way around – that Bavier didn’t like Andy. I’d thought I’d heard somewhere that among other things, Bavier didn’t like the fact that she was never mentioned in the opening credits of the show along with Andy, Barney, and Opie.

Lawson asked how many movies I’ve watched since my post last month where I said I’d probably start reviewing every movie I watch in order to generate more content for my blog. Well, I have to admit that I’ve watched several, but I didn’t get around to reviewing them. I’ll try to do a better job of posting reviews of the movies I watch from now on.

I mentioned a while back that I was planning to start a mailing list and send out notifications when I update my blog. Only one person has asked to join that list, so if anyone else would like to be added, let me know! Rich also pointed out that that you can use a site like Google Reader or Bloglines, and add the blogs that you read to it. That allows you to just check one website when you want to see who has updated their blog.